so be extracted from the kernel, and
this last, though more difficult to be obtained, is of a superior
quality than that taken from the pulp of the rind.

Nothing in the vegetable world can be more beautiful than a full-grown
specimen of the oil-palm, with its cluster of ripe fruit, their
bright-yellow colour contrasting finely with the deep-green of its long
curling fronds, that seem intended, as it were, to protect the rich
bunches from the too powerful rays of a tropic sun. I say nothing in
the vegetable world can be more beautiful than this, unless, indeed, it
be a whole forest of such trees; just such a forest as my companion and
I had now entered. Even the rude sailor was impressed by the grandeur
of the spectacle that surrounded us, and we both stopped mechanically to
gaze upon and admire it.

Far as the eye could reach rose a succession of straight trunks, that
looked as if they had been shaped by mechanical skill and were only
columns supporting the verdant canopy above, and this canopy from the
curling of the fronds and the regular division of the leaflets, appeared
to form grand arches, fretted and chased in the most elaborate manner.
From the columns, near their tops, hung the rich-yellow clusters, like
golden grapes, their brilliant colour adding to the general effect,
while the ground underneath was strewed with thousands of the egg-like
nuts, that had fallen from over-ripeness, and lay scattered over the
surface. It looked like some grand temple of Ceres, some gigantic
orchard of Nature's own planting!

I have thought--but long after that time--I have thought that if King
Dingo Bingo had but set his poor captives, and his bloody myrmidons as
well, to gather that golden crop, to press the oil from those pulpy
pericarps, what a fortune he might have been honestly the master of, and
what unhappiness he might have spared to thousands in whose misery alone
he was now making traffic!

CHAPTER NINETEEN.

For more than a mile we walked through this wonderful wood, and,
although we had admired it so much on first entering it, we were now
very desirous of getting out of it. It was not that it was a gloomy
forest: on the contrary, it was rather cheerful, for the light, pinnated
leaves permitted the sun to shine through, and just screened his rays
sufficiently to make it pleasant and cool. It was, therefore, rather
cheerful than gloomy. The reason why we so soon grew tired of it was,
that it was anyth